The new technology has a wide range of potential applications across the wound care, dentistry, medical device and veterinary markets.

The advantage of Pertinax is that unlike conventional CHX products, it does not dissipate rapidly and can provide precisely measured antimicrobial efficacy over days, weeks, months or even years. Consequently, Pertinax has the potential to significantly improve a wide range of existing CHX products, while also opening up the potential for new applications.

Pertinax was originally developed at the University of Bristol with primarily dental and oral hygiene applications in mind but during the past two years the company has validated the material in a very broad range of clinical and veterinary applications.

A UK patent for the technology was granted in November 2015 and a US patent was granted in August of this year.

To date, eight peer reviewed papers have been published on the use of Pertinax in a variety of applications, demonstrating the technology’s broad applicability, efficacy and safety.

Pertinax has key advantages when compared to conventional CHX formulations, including the following: the material requires lower quantities of CHX, with continuous antimicrobial function provided by less frequent applications than conventional CHX products; and it exhibits lower cytotoxicity than equivalent concentrations of conventional CHX.

Ashley Cooper, CEO at Pertinax Pharma, said: “Since the inception of the company, we have focussed our efforts and investment on the characterisation of Pertinax materials and the development of a scalable manufacturing process. Having achieved these major milestones, we are now ready and eager to engage with prospective commercial partners”.

Dr Michele Barbour, CSO, said: “Our unique, patented technology has wide potential application across human and vetinerary medicine. While there is scope for application across multiple sectors, wound care is our initial focus. Our technology is especially well suited to this field including in polyurethanes, alginates, acrylics and silicones”.

The company is actively seeking commercial partners in the wound care and medical device industries. Pertinax is available in kilogram quantities for development purposes and the company plans to establish commercial cGMP production over the next 12–18 months.

Pertinax materials will be regulated under the EU Medicines Directive as a new active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) or under the EU Biocide Regulations as a biocide depending on the intended use — with the reduction of antiseptic usage an appealing plus point for regulators.